


no bullying the blood donor

by tgtchm



Category: The Grand Tour (TV) RPF, Top Gear (UK) RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, Blood Drinking, Crack Treated Seriously, M/M, Trope Subversion/Inversion, but it's not explicitly detailed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-01
Updated: 2017-11-01
Packaged: 2019-01-27 20:50:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,737
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12590268
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tgtchm/pseuds/tgtchm
Summary: James and Jeremy have weathered a lot over the years—but Jeremy finds it a little hard to come to terms with the fact that one of his best mates might actually be a vampire.





	no bullying the blood donor

**Author's Note:**

> haha. oh boy. let me just start by saying that vampire fics are my staple. I've written countless numbers of them over the years. and from the moment I slid back into fandom I had a little niggling idea crashing around in my head: who is the most un-vampirelike person in the world? it's James May, of course. and it escalated from there. this is lighthearted crack but it's treated seriously, inasmuch as it can be.
> 
> also! my friend did some cute doodles for this fic and you can see them [here](https://twitter.com/tonycvrtis/status/925723513909940225) c:
> 
> i hope you enjoy ♡

“James,” Jeremy starts, peering into the depths of James’ freezer. “Why do you have a bag of blood in your freezer?”

James had invited him round to watch a film—simply because, with the way things have been going lately, they haven’t had time to decompress—and had waved Jeremy towards the fridge as soon as he’d arrived, muttering something about heating up dinner and he’d be right back as he needed to wash his hands (Jeremy saw the oil on his hands, a sure sign he’s been tinkering with his bike again). So Jeremy had opened the fridge and, upon finding nothing of interest in there, had gone for the freezer.

But for Christ’s sake, the last thing he’d expected to find in there was blood—it’s up there with a cow’s head, maybe, or a rogue limb. Blood simply just does not belong in James’ freezer. He can’t quite compute it, actually. It’s only until he reaches in and fishes it out and has it in his hands that he realises yes, it’s genuinely blood and genuinely frozen, and perhaps he should feel concern but all he can feel is confusion.

“Ah,” James says quietly from behind Jeremy, and when Jeremy turns with the blood in hand he finds James looking paler than Jeremy has ever seen him. He runs a hand through his hair and huffs. “You found that, did you?”

“Well I couldn’t miss it, could I! First thing I saw.” He takes a step closer and waggles the bag before it actually sinks in that he’s _holding human blood_ and he drops it on the kitchen bench, shaking his hands dramatically to disguise the fact that he’s actually quite unnerved. “May, explain.”

But James seems to be self-destructing. He’s got both hands covering his face and his shoulders are slumped, like he’s trying to make himself smaller. It’s alarming, to say the least. “Do you need blood transfusions?” Jeremy asks, taking a hesitant step closer. “Or have you murdered someone? Was it Hammond? I’ll help you hide the body, if you’d like. No? What is it, James? Are you a vampire, is that it?”

At that last word James looks up, terrified, and Jeremy freezes in place. “Oh, god. Are you… Are you _actually_ … a vampire?”

He’s feeling like a fool even as he says the words, because—well, it just can’t be possible. But James meets his eyes, and all the colour has drained from his face, and for a second Jeremy almost believes it. “I think so?” he murmurs. “I—I suppose so, yes—”

“Show me your fangs then.” Jeremy folds his arms over his chest and raises his eyebrow, shrugging when James just gapes back at him. “Well, go on.” When James doesn’t move he takes a step closer and reaches for his chin, but James jerks out of the way, eyes wide. “Show me your—”

“I don’t have fangs, Jeremy, you infantile pillock!” James replies, and steps back so he’s pressed up against the wall. “I—I just—”

Jeremy watches him struggle with his words for another few seconds before it all clicks together, and for a moment he feels even more of an idiot in the first place for falling for it. “Right. Where’s Hammond then?” he booms, stalking past James into the living room. Richard’s not there, but that doesn’t mean anything; he’s tiny, and so Jeremy gets down on his hands and knees to peer under the sofa. “Or are you filming it?” he calls into the kitchen as he comes up empty, getting to his feet again—with difficulty—and pacing down the hall. “Will this be on youtube later? _Jeremy Clarkson gets fooled by two colleagues, actually believes vampires exist_ —”

“Jeremy, stop,” James says wearily from behind him. “I’m not filming anything.”

“You don’t expect me to actually believe that you are a vampire,” he counters, shaking his head as he peers into James’ linen cupboard. “I’ve seen you in the sunlight, for Christ’s sake. Are you going senile?”

When he closes the cupboard again James has disappeared, presumably to fetch the camera he must have been filming with; now thoroughly irritated, Jeremy stalks down the hallway back to the kitchen, wishing he could find Hammond and throttle him. He’d just wanted to relax, not be wound up by his two idiotic colleagues—

But then James steps in front of him, holding something out on his palm. It’s the paperweight Jeremy recognises as having given him for Christmas some years ago; a heavy chunk of metal formed in the shape of a Spitfire. It’s sat on his desk in the house since. Before Jeremy can even ask how this is in any way relevant, James closes his fingers and, as easily as if he was crumpling paper, crushes the paperweight into a misshapen lump. When he unfurls his fingers all Jeremy can do is stare.

“I’m not nearly drunk enough for this,” he mutters, shoving past James as he heads to the kitchen.

***

He doesn’t say a word to James until he’s drunk three beers in quick succession, necking them and glaring at James the whole time. For his part, James just loiters, flitting back and forth between the living room and the kitchen, heating up dinner and being completely uncharacteristically silent. He can’t even _look_ at Jeremy.

“Were you bitten?” Jeremy deadpans after he’s finished the third beer, slumping back in his seat and resisting the urge to fold his arms over his chest once more. “Or was this some kind of… experiment?” When James just looks back at him impassively, he sighs. “Help me out here, James. I’m a man of science. This sort of thing does not come naturally to me.”

James perches on the end of the sofa, looking like he’s ready to flee at a moment’s notice. “I wasn’t bitten,” he says quietly, looking down at his hands. “Not an experiment, as far as I know. I just… woke up like this one day, about five or six years ago now.”

For a moment Jeremy struggles with the urge to make a smart comment, but he manages to rein it in with herculean self-control. Even if he’s dreaming this whole conversation—and this is the conclusion he’s reached as he downed those beers—dream-James still needs consolation, as this is obviously something he is struggling with. (What did he drink, before going to sleep, that he’s now dreaming about _vampires_ of all things?) “And what, exactly, do you mean by ‘like this’? Because I _know_ you can go out in the sunlight. So what are the limits of your,” and here he leans forward and adds air quotes, “‘condition’?”

James wilts even further under the questioning, but he answers, even if he sounds so small it’s like he is fading away entirely. “I can go out in the sunlight, yes. It’s more uncomfortable than it used to be, but it doesn’t hurt. And I don’t burn.”

“And you don’t have fangs.” Jeremy’s voice wobbles on the f-word, but he manages to keep it together, somehow.

“No fangs. And I haven’t died, or anything quite so dramatic. My heart is still beating, or it was last time I checked,” James jokes weakly. “I’m stronger than I used to be, obviously. I need to sleep less, but I still sleep. Other than that… I’m rather normal.”

“Except for the fact that you keep blood in your freezer.”

“Yes. Apart from that.”

 _What an inventive dream_ , he tells himself, patting his subconscious self on the back. He certainly wouldn’t have the imagination to dream something like this up himself. Perhaps he can work a column out of it. Although, on second thought, he doesn’t really want James catching wind of this dream _ever_. It’s embarrassing enough that he’s sitting here, watching Jeremy blankly. He will have to face him when he wakes up, too, and that will be _worse_ because that, at least, is real.

“Do I even want to know where it came from? You didn’t… I don’t know. Drug someone and steal their blood? Is that how you do it?” When James doesn’t answer straight away, he laughs, although there’s no humour in it. “Christ, James, I can’t even believe I’m having this conversation.”

“I can’t believe it’s my life,” James replies, and when Jeremy looks up he can see that James is meeting his eyes for the first time since he sat down—and it’s now that Jeremy realises that this _is_ real, that this is not a dream. Oh, God.

“I need another beer,” he mutters, and hauls himself upright. “Do you want one?” He pauses, cocks his head to the side. James still hasn’t moved. “You can still drink beer, correct?”

James sighs, like all these questions are draining—a bit rich, considering the circumstances. “Yes, I can still drink and eat and all of that. I wouldn’t have been able to hide that from you.” He stands up and hovers in the doorway as Jeremy fetches two beers from the fridge, noting that the bag of blood has disappeared from the counter. Back in the freezer where it belongs, presumably. “And I’ve never drugged anyone in my life. I’ve never even—I mean—bagged blood is all I know.”

“Where do you get it?” Jeremy asks, unable to stop himself as he presses the beer into James’ hand. “I mean, I can hardly picture you holding up the Red Cross at gunpoint. I expect that would be all over the papers.”

With that James smiles, and it’s such a familiar and oddly comforting sight that Jeremy relaxes slightly. “The internet is a wonderful place,” he replies, raising the glass to his lips and taking a long swallow.

“Out of all the things to find on the internet,” Jeremy says, and for a moment they both snigger at the old memories. But then James looks up into his face, his eyes wide, and Jeremy is reminded that this is _real_ , even though it cannot be: one of his best mates is a vampire, and he has no idea what to do about any of it.

The beers must have slightly gone to his head, because when James sits back down on the sofa Jeremy flops next to him and grabs his hand, turning it over to compare the colour of their skin. “We’re the same,” he complains, because he somehow wants more evidence of James’ otherness. “Some bloody vampire you are. Have you told anyone?”

“About this? Of course not, Jeremy. What could I say? You’d just laugh at me.” Jeremy opens his mouth to protest before remembering that he sort of did laugh at James, or at least laughed at the preposterousness of the situation, and closes it again. “And I didn’t want to be locked away and poked and prodded as doctors tried to figure what went wrong with me. It’s just been easier to keep quiet.”

He shifts, realising he’s still holding James’ hand, and drops it as he thinks. “I’m not going to tell anyone,” he replies, slowly so he doesn’t say the wrong thing. His head is spinning, still—hasn’t stopped since James crushed that bloody Spitfire—but he knows he needs to say this. “You’re still my mate. I mean, it’s pretty fucking weird…” he trails off, gesturing lazily to all of James and reaching for the last of his beer. “But I won’t even tell Hammond if you don’t want me to.”

At that James sags completely, going limp on the sofa like someone’s just removed all his bones. Jeremy reaches for him alarmedly before realising he’s smiling gratefully, and stops, hands in midair. “Thank you, Jeremy. I had—well, I had no idea how anyone would react if they ever found out.”

“I’ve never had someone come out of the coffin to me before,” Jeremy replies, finishing his beer. James elbows him so hard he nearly spills it all down his front, and then they’re both laughing, although at what Jeremy’s not sure. It still doesn’t feel _real_. “How _did_ you hide it from us? There’s been times where we’ve lived in each other’s pockets for weeks. I’d like to think I’d have noticed you sneaking off to a blood bank.”

“I don’t have to… drink,” James says, embarrassed, “as often as I have to eat. Once a week is best, but I can go for three weeks if I need to. Really rare steak helps.”

It almost sounds like, although hesitant, it’s a relief to talk about all this. Which makes sense. If, by some horrible circumstance, Jeremy’d woken up with a sudden thirst for blood he would either want to tell the whole world about it, knowing they wouldn’t believe him, or tell no one at all. But James—James isn’t the sort to go spreading his personal issues around. It’s no wonder he’s emotionally constipated, if he’s been sitting on this secret for years.

“What happens if you don’t indulge your little idiosyncrasy?” he asks, realising he’s almost certainly tipsy and the world is spinning, just a bit. “Do you go rabid? Fantasise about sinking your teeth into my neck—”

James stops him with a glare that could cut through iron, and he shuts up, wisely ( _he’s a vampire!_ his brain squeaks, as another part of him thinks _he’s James May!_ ). “Don’t,” James says quietly, and there’s a weight behind his words. “Don’t take the piss, Jeremy.”

It’s not like he’s ever been serious about anything in his life, but he nods, knowing James is probably right. “Okay. I apologise.”

Nodding, James looks down at his hands. “It’s not very pleasant. I can start to hear people’s heartbeats, notice their veins, things like that. It’s distracting. And rather unnerving, if I’m at all honest.”

“When was the last time you last sampled the delights from your freezer?” Jeremy asks, knowing he’s going to absurd lengths to actually say the words ‘drinking’ and ‘blood’ in the same sentence as ‘James May’. The drunker he gets, the more idiotic this all seems. “Speaking of, how’s dinner?”

James’ eyes only linger on his neck for a heartbeat before he turns away and gets off the sofa. “A week ago,” he calls from the kitchen, and Jeremy hears the banging of the oven door closing. “And dinner’s ready.”

They enjoy a lasagna together, not even bothering to move, just sitting on the sofa and leaning over the coffee table instead. James flicks around to see what’s on telly and they both snort when they go past Dave and see their own faces on the screen. “That was season, what was it, seventeen? Were you a vampire then?”

“Yes,” James replies, and stabs his fork into his lasagna.

They eventually settle on some film that they both immediately stop paying attention to—not least because Jeremy is onto a bottle of wine, now, and James is steadily keeping up. By the time they’ve finished dinner Jeremy is well and truly drunk, and he gets up off the sofa and mutters something about using the toilet.

He doesn’t go that way at all, though. Instead he slips into James’ study and opens his desk drawer, finding what he’s looking for immediately. It’s rare that he lauds James’ pedantic tendencies, but this is one of those times; he makes his way back down the hall with one hand on the wall, the other clutching his prize.

“James,” he starts, as James clears away the plates. The low buzz of the film and the pleasant _clink_ of dishes going into the dishwasher provides a very domestic soundtrack to what he suspects will be the most absurd thing he has ever done in his entire life—which is saying a lot. “Come here.”

James obliges, wiping his hands on a teatowel and standing at the end of the sofa. “What is it?”

“No, sit,” Jeremy urges, and reaches out to snag James’ wrist, pulling him down. “And don’t interrupt. I want to give you something.” And it’s here that he unfurls his first, revealing what he’d nicked—James’ swiss army knife. “My blood. I want to give you my blood.”

James rears off the sofa, scrambling backwards until he hits the wall with a thud. There’s a wildness in his eyes that wasn’t there before, and it’s this that makes Jeremy pause, to rethink what he’s offering. Did he just—

Yes. He did.

“Jeremy,” James says, and his voice is thick with longing and fear all at once. “You don’t want that.”

“I do, actually,” Jeremy replies in a conversational tone, unfolding the blade on the knife and testing it with a fingertip. “I’m as curious as you are as to what would happen. And I think it’s rather generous of me. You haven’t even said thank you.”

“For fuck’s sake!” James explodes. “You’re playing with things you don’t know about, Clarkson. Even I have no idea what could happen. This isn’t a joke, and I don’t—”

Jeremy leans forward and waves the knife about. “I’m not joking, believe it or not. I’m offering to slit my wrists here and now for you. I know you want it.”

“Don’t slit anything,” James replies, but he brushes his hair away from his face and takes a step closer, albeit guardedly. “I just… You’re drunk. You’re clearly not thinking straight. And I’ll bet you’ll regret this in the morning.”

“I’ll bet I won’t.” Jeremy leans forward and grabs James’ hand again, yanking him back down on the sofa. With how strong he is he could probably get away if he really wanted to, but he mustn’t, because he doesn’t. “Do you want to do it, or shall I?”

James hesitates, but he sighs. “You aren’t going to let this go, are you?” he asks, and when Jeremy shakes his head, sighs again. “Alright. Fine. I must really be going insane. You do it, I wouldn’t want to cut you too deep.”

Without even hesitating, Jeremy takes the blade of the swiss army knife and draws it across his wrist. The cut is deep enough to sting and start welling up with blood instantly, but it’s not gushing, and he regards it proudly before looking up at James—and his heart nearly stops in his chest. James has an expression of pure, raw hunger on his face, and it’s strangely captivating. Jeremy only has enough time to shove his weeping wrist in his direction before he grabs it and licks at the wound.

He’d sort of expected it to feel nice—that’s how it is on TV, isn’t it? Girls all moaning when Dracula sinks his fangs in?—but instead it just feels vaguely unpleasant, like someone’s licking at his wrist. Which is exactly what James is doing, his tongue pressed flat against the wound, lips wrapped around it to make a seal. His eyes are closed but there’s such an expression of bliss on his face it’s like he’s just found the solution to world peace, and Jeremy feels a strange swell of pride at being the one to give that to him. Must be the alcohol, because he’s smiling when James pulls away, his pupils dilated like he’s high. “I’ll get a plaster,” he says, sounding dazed, but Jeremy just shakes his head.

“I’ll get it. It’s fine.”

What a pair they make—one drunk and one high. When he makes it back to the sofa, his wrist safely bandaged up, James is still sitting there. He hasn’t moved an inch. Jeremy can see a smear of crimson on his lip and, as he sits down, leans over and swipes at it with his thumb. It’s absurdly intimate, but then James has just drunk his blood, and if that’s not a sure sign that their friendship has become something else then he doesn’t know what is. “So, how was that?”

“A bit shit, actually,” James replies faintly, touching his lips with the tips of his fingers.

Whatever Jeremy was expecting, it certainly wasn’t that. “Excuse me? I let you suck on my _blood_ and all you have to say is that it was ‘a bit shit’?”

James snaps back to reality and fixes Jeremy with a stare, but he’s smiling. “You taste like beer and cigarettes.”

“Well it’s not my bloody fault if you’ve driven me to drink on account of you being an actual real life vampire, is it!”

“You drink and smoke all day, Jeremy. It was hardly going to taste like smarties.” They’re both smiling now, even though Jeremy’s a _little_ bit hurt. Not that he’d ever say so. James must sense it anyway, because he reaches for Jeremy’s wrist and flips it over, inspecting the bandage. “It was… different. Not bad different. Interesting. It felt… more intimate. Less clinical.” He pauses and then exhales with a rush. “Sorry. I don’t know how else to describe it.”

For once in his life he decides not to be glib, although it takes effort. “No, don’t be. I appreciate you sharing this with me.” He realises that James still has his wrist, and none of them make a move to pull away. “As strange as it is.”

“We’ve weathered worse,” James agrees. “After all, what's a bit of blood drinking between friends?”

Jeremy flattens his lips in a line, but it only takes a tremble from James and then they’re off—laughing so hard they can hardly breathe, falling over each other, James nearly sliding off the sofa which makes it all the more funny. _Must be the alcohol_ , Jeremy thinks, really knowing that it’s not. _Must be the blood loss_ , he thinks, and this he can agree with.

“Next time,” James says once they’ve calmed down, although they’re both gasping for air, “next time don’t have anything to drink. Maybe you’ll taste less like beer and more like, I don’t know, something nice.”

“Next time? I didn’t realise there was to be a next time,” replies Jeremy, raising his eyebrows and folding his arms over his chest. “Am I that addictive? Once you’ve had a taste, you can’t get enough?”

James just shakes his head ruefully as he gets up from the sofa, staggering slightly. “You’re a pillock, Jeremy,” he says, but he’s smiling.

“No bullying the blood donor,” Jeremy calls to his retreating back, grinning as James laughs and laughs and laughs.

**Author's Note:**

> special thanks to dani, who encouraged me to write this even though we both know how dumb it is, and to ellie for reading it diligently and not laughing, and ofc to aerin for the cute drawings that live on my lockscreen now <3


End file.
